GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THE PROBLEM STATED 25
is or is not desirable and whether, in particular, it is or is
not superior to the opposite principle of immorality, we
are more likely to find it where it is "writ large" than
where it is "writ small". Now the State is the individual
"writ large". Therefore, we are likely to find the principle
of morality more easily in the State than in the individual,
and most easily 'of all in the best of all possible States, since
the best of all possible States is likely to exhibit it the most
clearly. After what model, then, are we to conceive the
best of all possible States? To answer the question, Socrates
embarks upon the construction of an ideal State, an under-
taking which occupies him more or less continuously
throughout the rest of the Republic. The analogy between
the State and the individual, an analogy which entails the
important implication
that what is true of the one will
mutatis mutandis be true of the other, what is good for the
one, good also for the other, is often invoked by writers on
political theory, arid we shall meet it again in the writings
of nineteenth century political theorists. The question
inevitably arises how far the analogy is a valid one;
this question is considered in a later chapter. 1 Plato
regards the analogy as fruitful, frequently applying to the
State the principles which he has discovered to operate
in the soul of man, and vice versa interpreting the workings
of the soul after the model of those of the State. It is
on the basis of this analogy that in the Republic he
now turns his attention to politics. Before we follow him,
I propose to say something about the corollaries which
follow from this somewhat abrupt transition, from the
to a
transition, that is to say, from an ethical question
political answer. These are both important
and highly characteristic of Greek thought.
in themselves
Socratcs's Search for an Ordering Intelligence. The
first of these corollaries is embodied in the celebrated
announcement that man is a social or political being.
The implications of this announcement are far reaching.
1 Sec Chapter XVIII, pp. 759-765.